The Fight for Power and the “Fight” for Sops

Published:Vperyod, No. 17, June 14, 1906.

      Published according to theVperyodtext.Source:Lenin
	  Collected Works,

      Progress Publishers,1965,

      Moscow,Volume 11,

      pages27-31.Translated:Transcription\Markup:R. CymbalaPublic Domain:Lenin Internet Archive

      (2004).You may freely copy, distribute,
	display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and
	commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet
	Archive” as your source.•README

Itis common knowledge that already in its programme the
Social-Democratic Party expressed the unshakable conviction that really to
satisfy the urgent needs of the mass of the peopleall power must be in the
hands of the people. If the mass of the people do not have theentirestate power in their hands, if any organ of power not elected by
the people, not liable to dismissal, and not entirely dependent on the people,
is allowed to remain, it will beimpossiblereally to satisfy the
urgent and universally admitted needs of the people.

TheSocial-Democratic Party has always exerted every effort to spread this
indisputable truth among the proletariat and among the whole people. The real,
that is, the mass struggle for freedom has always passed, and always will pass,
through the most varied and often unexpected stages. It cannot be otherwise
owing to the enormous difficulties of the struggle, the complexity of its tasks
and the changes taking place in the ranks of the fighters. In guiding the
proletarian struggle at every stage in its development and under all
circumstances, the Social-Democratic Party, as the conscious champion of the
aspirations of the working class, must constantly bear in mind the general and
fundamental interests of this struggle as a whole. Social-Democracy teaches us
not to forget the general interests of the working class for the sake of
particular interests; not to allow the specific features of the individual
stages of the struggle to cause us to forget the fundamental aims of the
struggle as a whole.

Thisis how the revolutionary Social-Democrats have always conceived their tasks
      in the present Russian revolution; and this conception alone is in
      accordance with the position and tasks of the proletariat as the advanced
      class. On the other hand, in conformity with the specific class interests
      of the bourgeoisie, the liberal bourgeoisie has always formulated its
      tasks in the struggle for political freedom quite differently. The
      bourgeoisie needs political freedom, but it is afraid to allow the people
      to have full power, because the proletariat, developed and united in the
      course of the struggle, would use this power of the people against the
      bourgeoisie. Hence, while striving for political freedom, the bourgeoisie
      nevertheless wants to retain a number of survivals from the old regime
      (the standing army, a non-elected bureaucracy, and so forth).

Theproletariat’s struggle for political freedom isrevolutionary,
because its object is to secure complete democracy. The bourgeoisie’s struggle
for freedom isopportunist, be cause its object is to obtain sops, to
divide power between the autocracy and the propertied classes.

Thisfundamental difference between the revolutionary struggle of the
proletariat and the opportunist struggle of the bourgeoisie can be traced
through the whole history of our revolution. The proletariat is fighting, the
bourgeoisie is stealing its way into power. The proletariat is shattering the
autocracy by its struggle; the bourgeoisie clutches at the sops thrown to it by
the enfeebled autocracy. Before the whole people the proletariat holds on high
the standard of struggle; the bourgeoisie raises the flag of minor concessions,
deals and haggling.

Theproletariat takes advantage of every breach, every weakening of the regime,
every concession and sop in order to wage a more extensive, more determined,
more intense and more mass struggle; the bourgeoisie uses them to cause the
struggle gradually to calm down, weaken and die out, to curtail its aims and
moderate its forms.

Letus review some of the stages of our struggle for freedom. The bourgeoisie
“fights” to compel the government to show confidence in
the Zemstvo[1](“Rights and an Authoritative Zemstvo”) and in the
people (at the beginning of the present decade). The proletariat unfurls the
banner ofthe struggle to overthrow the autocracy. The government proclaims an
era of “confidence”[2](Svyatopolk-Mirsky). The bourgeoisie pours
out a flood of speeches at banquets; the proletariat forces new breaches in the
citadel of tyranny, dying in the streets on the 9th of January,[3]and starting a
huge strike movement.

Thesummer of 1905. The bourgeoisie sends a deputation to plead for
liberties. In the autumn the Bulygin Duma[4]is granted. The bourgeoisie is moved
to tears of gratitude. A general cry goes up: to the Duma! The opportunist
Social-Democrats waver. The proletariat continues to fight. A strike wave such
as the world has never seen before spreads over the whole country and sweeps
away the Duma. The proletariat seizes freedom and defends it with its blood
against the encroachments of the autocracy.

Inthe first battle the proletariat is defeated. The bourgeoisie spurns the
vanquished and slavishly clutches at the Duma. The proletariat gathers its
forces for a fresh onslaught. It continues proudly to hold on high the banner of
the struggle for complete democracy. But the onslaught could not be accomplished
before the convocation of the Duma. The bourgeoisie once again grovels, throws
overboard the slogan of a constituent assembly, froths at the mouth against
“actions” and advocates conciliation, coming to terms, and the
appointment by the supreme authority of a Cadet Cabinet.

Theproletariat takes advantage of the new situation just as it did of the
period of “confidence” in 1904, and of October 17,
1905.[5]It performs its revolutionary duty and does all in its power to sweep
away the Witte Duma[6]as it swept away the Bulygin Duma. But it is
unsuccessful, owing to the treachery of the bourgeoisie, and the inadequate
organisation and mobilisation of the working class and peasantry. The
proletariat continues the fight,utilisingall the “Duma”
conflicts and the conflicts around the Duma as points of departure for a wider
and more determined mass movement.

Anew struggle is developing. No one denies this. The proletarians, the
peasants, the urban poor, the soldiers, etc., are rising in much greater masses
than before. No one denies that this will be a struggle outside the Duma. Owing
to the objective conditions of the present situation, it willbe a struggle directly aimed at the destruction of the old regime. To what
      extent it will be destroyed, no one can foretell. But the proletariat, as
      the advanced class, is striving with greater determination than ever for
      complete victory in this struggle, for the complete abolition of the old
      regime.

Andthe proletariat remains consistent, rejecting the opportunist slogans of the
bourgeoisie which have misled a certain section of the Social-Democrats. It is
not true to say that the appointment of a Cadet Cabinet means “wresting
power” from the hands of the camarilla. That is a bourgeois lie. As a
matter of fact the appointment of such a Cabinet at the present time will be a
new liberal screen for the camarilla. It is not true to say that the appointment
of a Cadet Cabinet will transform the fictitious constitution into a real
one. That is a bourgeois lie. As a matter of fact such a Cabinet will merely
enable the autocracy to cover itself with a new cloak of
pseudo-constitutionalism. It is not true to say that the demand for a Cadet
Cabinet is being taken up by the whole people. That is a bourgeois lie. As a
matter of fact it is only being demanded by the Cadet Duma. The fact that
non-Cadets are echoing it is due only to a misunderstanding, for they think it
means much more than it actually does. The demands of thewhole peopleare in fact much more drastic than the demands of the Cadet Duma. Lastly, it is
also not true to say that “supporting” the demand for a Cadet
Cabinet (or, what amounts to the same thing, supporting a Cadet Cabinet) with
the aid of resolutions, instructions to deputies, and so forth, means actually
fighting the old regime. That is a bourgeois lie. For the proletariat, such
“support” would simply mean abandoning the struggle, handing over
the cause of freedom to the wavering liberals.

Theproletariat is fighting, and will continue to fight, to destroy the old
regime. Towards this end it will direct all its propaganda and agitation, and
all its efforts to organise and mobilise the masses. If it fails to destroy the
old regime completely, it will take advantage even of its partial
destruction. But it will never advocate partial destruction, depict this in rosy
colours, or call upon the people to sup port it. Real support in a genuine
struggle is given to thosewho strive for the maximum (achieving something less in the event of failure)
and not to those who opportunistically curtail the aims of the strugglebefore the fight.

Thosewho are not dazzled by flashy phrases will easily see that the people willactuallyfight, not for a Cadet Cabinet, but to abolish the old
regime. It is in the interests of the bureaucracy todiminishthe real
scope of this struggle. It is in the interests of the proletariat toexpandand intensify it.

[1]Zemstvos—the so-called local self-government bodies,
dominated by the nobility, set up in the central gubernias of tsarist Russia in
1864. Their competence was confined to purely local economic and welfare
matters (hospital and road building, statistics, insurance, etc.), and they
functioned under the control of the provincial governors and the Minister of
the Interior, who could invalidate any decisions the government found
undesirable.

[2]Theera of“confidence” of the
government towards society was proclaimed in the autumn of 1904 by
Svyatopolk-Mirsky, Minister of the Interior. In connection with the growing
revolutionary movement the tsarist government, counting on deceiving the people
and winning over the liberal bourgeoisie, made some minor concessions—a
slight relaxation of the censorship, a partial amnesty and permission for
congresses of Zemstvo officials. The liberals welcomed this “new”
policy, as they regarded it, of the government. At their banquets they spoke of
the constitution and of the necessity of their approach to power. The Mensheviks
placed great hopes in this “banquet campaign”; they put forward a
plan for influencing the liberal bourgeoisie so that the liberals should put
political demands to the tsarist government in the name of the people. The
Bolsheviks vigorously opposed the Menshevik plan. They pointed out that to place
one’s hopes in the liberal bourgeoisie meant trailing in the rear of the
bourgeois movement and they called on the workers to head the struggle of all
the militant revolutionary forces against the autocracy. The Bolsheviks exposed
the hypocrisy of the government’s policy and its talk of a period of
“confidence”. Lenin wrote in autumn 1904: “...While it has been
flirting with the Zemstvos and has granted them some paltry concessions, the
government has not, in actual fact, con ceded anything whatever to the people;
it may still well revert to (or rather continue) its reactionary course as has
happened in Russia tens and hundreds of times after a momentary flash of
liberalism from one autocrat or another” (present edition,

Vol.7,p. 506). On December 12 (25), 1904, Nicholas II signed a ukase
which emphasised the “inviolability of the fundamental laws of the
Empire” and demanded severe punishment “for all arbitrary
acts”. Although the ukase contained vague promises of some extension of
the rights of rural and urban institutions it entirely avoided the question of a
constitution for Russia. This ukase, which Lenin called a “slap in the face for
the liberals” showed that the government had decided to put an end to the
era of “confidence”.

[3]January 9, 1905—the day on which St. Petersburg workers with
their wives and children marched towards the Winter Palaceto present a petition to the tsar describing their intolerable lot and complete
lack of rights. By order of the tsar this peaceful demonstration of unarmed
workers was fired on by the troops. This cold-blooded massacre started a wave of
mass political strikes and demonstrations all over Russia, under the slogan of
“Down with the autocracy!” The events of January 9 marked the beginning of
the revolution of 1905-07.

[4]TheBulygin Duma—anadvisory “representative
institution” which the tsarist government intended to convene in 1905. The
Bill for the establishment of a State Duma with advisory powers and the
Regulations on elections to the Duma were drafted by a commission presided over
by D. L. Bulygin, Minister of the Interior, and made public together with the
tsar’s Manifesto of August 6 (19), 1905. The Bolsheviks proclaimed an active
boycott of the Bulygin Duma and the government did not succeed in convening
it. It was swept away under the impact of the revolution.

[5]This refers to the tsar’s Manifesto of October 17, 1905
issued at a time when the all-Russian political general strike was at its
height. The tsar’s Manifesto, which promised “civil liberties” an a
a “legislative” Duma, was a political manoeuvre of the autocracy
aimed at gaining time, splitting the revolutionary forces, breaking the strike
and crushing the revolution. Its promises were a deception of the masses and
were never carried out.

[6]TheWitte Duma—the First State Duma, convened on
April 27 (May 10), 1906, on a franchise drawn up by the Prime Minister
S. Y. Witte. On July 8 (21), 1906, this Duma was dissolved by the
tsarist government.